Staten Islander's Model A car needs intensive care

"It survived floods and blizzards, but then superstorm Sandy comes along, bringing six feet of black, salt-polluted water into our beautiful finished basement and destroys the car," says Midland Beach resident Joseph Fedullo Sr. of his 1931 Model A Ford, purchased in 1953 when he was 18. "The Model A is just another Sandy victim waiting to be rebuilt."Family Photo

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The 1931 Model A Ford that Joseph Fedullo purchased in 1953, when he was 18 years old, was tucked away for decades in the rear basement of his Slater Boulevard home.

The car remained “safe and sound for 47 years as I worked on restoring it to its proper glory,” Fedullo, of Midland Beach, said.

“It survived floods and blizzards, but then superstorm Sandy comes along, bringing six feet of black, salt-polluted water into our beautiful finished basement and destroys the car. The Model A is just another Sandy victim waiting to be rebuilt.”

It was “the ocean breeze and cleaner air” that prompted Fedullo and his wife, Aileen, to purchase the Slater Boulevard home when they decided to move to Staten Island in 1967 from the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn.

“And we could drive down to (then-named) Seaside Boulevard (now Father Capodanno Boulevard), go over the bridge, and get to work in 20 minutes,” said Fedullo, who worked as a laboratory technician at Brooklyn College for over 35 years, as did his wife.

“We watched our house being built,” he said, noting that they knew the front was constructed at legal grade, and the rear at a lower, “potter grade.”

Over the decades, the only water damage sustained from powerful storms was “peanuts,” said Fedullo. “Maybe we had three to four inches of water in the basement, and lost a rug or a floor.”

Sandy was different.

The hurricane damaged half of the home’s roof, and inundated the back yard with six feet of water and sewage that did not fully recede until three days later.

The basement sustained major damage from the surge, with water rising to a foot above the hot-water tanks, destroying them, the heater, a collection of power tools, and air-conditioners. Also destroyed were about 3,000 books, including collectibles.

During the storm, “we had three sump pumps going on a generator, and we lost the generator,” said Mrs. Fedullo. 

SUNKEN MODEL A

Housed in the rear of the basement was the 1931 Ford Model A Roadster with the classic convertible top, side-curtain windows, and “perfect chrome” that Fedullo was slowly restoring “from parts that I collected over the years.”

For safety reasons, he had long ago drained all the vehicle’s gasoline and oil, and removed the battery. “Every month, I turned over the engine with the crank.”

As the city issued warnings about the predicted power of Hurricane Sandy, Fedullo judged the car safe in the basement, based on experience with previous storms.

“I thought, at most, that the tires would get wet,” he said.

In fact, it was a disaster.

“Old cars sink — they don’t float because they’re not watertight,” said Fedullo.

“We couldn’t get to the car for a week. It was surrounded by (the basement’s) cement walls, and the water had nowhere to go.”

Surveying the damage to the vehicle, “we had to rip out the convertible top, the seats, the floorboards, the whole interior, and drain water out of the motor, the transmission, and the rear end. The motor needs to be rebuilt, and the piston rings replaced.”

“We watched things rust before our eyes,” Mrs. Fedullo recalled. 

TO THE RESCUE

The Fedullos, who will celebrate their 49th wedding anniversary next month (June), were overwhelmed at the support they received from their three children and daughter-in-law after the storm.

Joseph Jr., 37, a suspension engineer with General Motors, drove to Staten Island from his home in Harrisburg, Mich., with his wife, Heather, an acoustical engineer who works for Ford. Timothy, 24, also lives in Harrisburg and is an engineer at Ford. Daughter Aileen lives nearby on Mason Avenue.

“The kids from Michigan came several times,” said a grateful Mrs. Fedullo.

On a visit on the weekend of April 19, Joseph Jr. arrived with a flat-bed, and towed the wrecked Model A back to Michigan, a 10-hour drive.

“It’s his car now,” said his father.

“Sandy did a real number on it, so I brought it back to my home to bring it back to life,” said Fedullo Jr.